


Bilingual

by Oona_Queen_of_the_Gay



Series: Web of Fragments [3]
Category: Avalon: Web of Magic - Rachel Roberts
Genre: F/M, Originally Posted on FanFiction.Net, cute teenage romantic awakening, for a kid raised by wolves zach is weirdly good at math, french phonemes are the hottest phonemes, i wrote this when i could actually speak french i promise, written june 2010
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-03
Updated: 2020-05-03
Packaged: 2021-03-02 03:22:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 496
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23978143
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Oona_Queen_of_the_Gay/pseuds/Oona_Queen_of_the_Gay
Summary: Zach learns something new about his best (human) friend
Relationships: Adriane Charday/Zach
Series: Web of Fragments [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1728790
Comments: 1
Kudos: 1





	Bilingual

**Author's Note:**

> Imported from my awom one-shot anthology "Web of Fragments" on FFN -- because these fics may be old af, but don't deserve to languish on that hellsite for all eternity. Originally written on June 11th, 2010. Enjoy!

"You're awesome at quadratics," Adriane laughed.

"It's right?" Zach looked up from the science textbook.

"Yeah, all of it."

On that warm summer night, they sat around Adriane's kitchen table with glasses of iced tea and a small army of school books and worksheets.

"Why doesn't _this_ make as much sense as quad-whatsits?" Zach frowned and gestured to the pile of science work. "What's an atom, anyway? If it's so small, why should I care about it? How do you even understand this?"

Adriane sighed and Zach instantly felt guilty. The elves had taught him reading, writing, and arithmetic—but now she was devoting so much to teaching him everything else.

"I'm sorry," he said. "I should be thanking you, not complaining."

"It's okay, but it's a weird problem. How do you teach science to someone who's learned to see the world through magic?"

Suddenly, muffled music rang from a little black rectangle on the table—'cell phone,' she had called it.

Adriane glanced at a glowing part on the front. "It's my dad," she picked it up, poked it, and then held it to her ear. Humans made the strangest inventions when they didn't have mirrors or porta-portals.

" _Salut Papa, ça va?_ " Adriane spoke is strange-sounding words, utterly foreign to him.

Pause.

" _Vraiment?_ " she sounded excited. " _Quand venez-vous?_ "

A longer pause.

" _Et vous pouvez loger dans la petite maison à côté de la notre!_ "

She continued with those words that flowed like music—a voice that was both hers and unlike anything he had ever heard. He watched her mouth, realizing just then how interesting and beautiful her full lips were as they moved exotically around these words. Like a spell, her language drew him in by illuminating his old friend in this entrancing new light. Why had he never noticed this before?

" _Bonne nuit_ ," she said, smiling, and put down the phone. She turned back to him, unaware that he had been staring at her instead of the chapter on atoms.

"My dad said that he and my mom want to visit next month," she said in her normal voice and language, then waited for a response that he couldn't offer. Where did the music go? Confused with mental whiplash, he only blinked at her. "What's wrong?" she leaned over the table towards him, scrutinizing.

 _That was beautiful_ , he thought. He didn't realize that he'd said it aloud until Adriane's face turned to shock. "Well—um, I…" he couldn't think.

"Oh, uh, the language," blushing, she diverted her gaze to the checkered kitchen curtains. "It's called French—my dad speaks it—and, um, yeah. I guess it's pretty…pretty."

Impulsively, he blurted: "Can I learn it?"

"Well, sure I guess. Kara learns it in school. I learned it from my dad when I was little. I could put it on our list…"

He just grinned at her and she smiled back, somewhat puzzled. Right then, he wanted nothing more than to understand that music.


End file.
